When we checked into our Airbnb, the lights were all dead. Like, pitch black. They‘re all controlled by these overcooked touchscreen panels in every room, and “one guy” in London knows how to fix them. So, they moved us to another unit for the night. The next day… 
...they moved us back, and began unpacking a ton of IKEA floor lights to solve the problem. (To their credit, a quality workaround!) But at this point my nerd brain had enough and I started opening cabinets!!!
* note: Nicole bought the flowers. One weird Airbnb improvement trick
* note: Nicole bought the flowers. One weird Airbnb improvement trick
Bingo! Hell. First weird thing: NOTHING was plugged into the Ethernet hub?!? No relays, no controllers. Also noticed the “master controller” had an RS232 output that ALSO wasn’t plugged in to the adapter. So I plugged it all in! Now the controllers worked! But no lights…
...until I found this random junk closet was hiding an “iLight” panel, that itself was hiding a fuse bank. And every single breaker was off?!?!? Flipped them all and wahey! We have lights!!!!! I did it!
To say my kind Airbnb host was surprised and delighted is an understatement. Also, I would have fixed it quicker, but UK breakers have a little indicator that’s “GREEN” for “OFF” and “RED” for “ON” 😒😒😒 so I didn’t realize they were off at first!!
Anyway, on vacation
(Some of you wondered if these switches were secretly iPod Touches. Well, one just glitched out and.... hello old friend!!)
They’re in a real pickle here. There are no traditional switches in any room. Every single light runs back to that one closet. To back out of this system they’re gonna have to basically rip open every wall and ceiling. Folks: I say this as a tech nerd... light switches are good
